The infill developers are putting on a forum. But instead of seating people in a panel and taking questions at a microphone, they’re throwing an open house, inviting all candidates and voters to a semi-structured mix and mingle.

Voters can drop in and make a beeline right for the candidate they want to question.

“Everyone’s been at a forum before where everyone answers the same questions,” said Mariah Samji, executive director for the Infill Development in Edmonton Association. “We wanted to make sure everyone can get their questions answered.”

Incumbent mayoral candidate Don Iveson will be at the Sept. 28 event and 15 other candidates have already confirmed attendance, said Samji. They’ll be organized by quadrants of the city, with the mayoral candidates in the middle. Voters can go from table to table and drop into conversations.

The Sept. 28 event runs between 5 p.m. and 8 p.m. at the Hyatt Place Hotel on Jasper Avenue and 95 Street. Free tickets are available at infilledmonton.com.

Edmonton Elections officials are still organizing traditional forums, but they’re including at least 20 minutes of free time to mingle and connect with candidates one-on-one. They’re also promoting forums organized by community leagues and other groups on their website edmonton.ca/election.

The city’s “where to vote” tool is also live. Elections director Iain MacLean is urging residents to check it out, especially since some neighbourhoods previously in Wards 12 and 9 (south boundary of Edmonton) have shifted this election to Wards 11 and 10.

The Local Good (thelocalgood.ca) is also breaking the mould with its Oct. 12 forum, with candidates gathering at Yellowhead Brewery.

“It allows for a better exchange of ideas,” said Tommy Kalita, a member who is planning to attend. They’ve run other election forums this way and found conversations flow naturally.

Participants can ask a question or just listen in, he said, with the crowd preventing any one person from monopolizing the discussion.

Both candidates and members of the public can hear from the Edmonton Social Planning Council’s John Kolkman, Edmonton Public Teachers’ Heather Quinn or Black Lives Matter’s Bashir Mohamed, and five others.

They’ll talk about how public transit, poverty, the environment, racism and child care are at issue this election, hoping the candidates come away more informed and members of the public are equipped to ask questions of the candidates in their wards.

Edmonton’s mayoral race has 13 candidates. “Instead of trying to get 13 people to state what their position is on each issue, we decided to put a focus on the issue,” said Public Interest Alberta executive director Joel French.

Candidates will be able to register for a table and engage with voters after the program. They’re expecting between 50 and 100 members of the public to come out. It’s free and runs from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. Sept. 25 at the Hellenic Community Centre, 10450 116 St.

“Build nice stuff that fits in. Don’t build Darth Vader architecture that’s polarizing,” said Ward 10 Coun. Michael Walters, leading the change in approach after being shocked by a 8.9-metre-high black wall now confronting one homeowner in the neighbourhood of Lansdowne.

“Any redevelopment at all that happens in a fairly stable mature neighbourhood should make an effort to respect the context and fit into that neighbourhood,” he said, before the motion at council’s urban planning committee. Councillors will get a report from administration with options to regulate design next year.

Only 34 property owners have split lots in Ward 10 in the last three years. Several created long, narrow skinny homes that are “polarizing” and turning residents against new development, Walters said, sharing pictures of one with black, metal siding and a blocky shape that cuts the neighbour’s view of the street.

“In an old, more rundown area, it’s ridiculous to assume you want to fit into that context. That’s a full-throttle renew,” he said, suggesting design requirements should be more loose there. “(But) this gradual renewal … should pay heed to the existing architecture.”

City officials are midway through what they call Infill 2.0 — a study of how the city can encourage more medium-density development along transit corridors and near new employment hubs and activity centres.

Officials gave an update Wednesday and also reviewed why Edmonton’s small-scale infill is not taking off the way many expected. Skinny homes are being built and sold in a select few neighbourhoods, usually not in economically challenged neighbourhoods that could most use the redevelopment.

Plus, city officials said most of the brownstones, courtyard apartments and other medium-density development they believe would lead to more affordable homes for the average homebuyer can’t be built under existing zoning rules without variances.

Developer Baidar Rana is building 10 units of row housing on what was two 15-metre (50-foot) lots near 156 Street and 90 Avenue, in Edmonton, shown on Sunday, Sept. 3, 2017.

Developer Mick Graham, president of the Infill Development Association of Edmonton, said extra charges, restrictions and long delays mean some row-house projects even on main roads can’t be built.

Two skinny homes in the suburbs can be built and sold before an identical home in a mature neighbourhood gets permits, said Graham. The increased land costs and permitting delays add almost $100,000 to the cost of the house, with delays costing a developer or homeowner $500 a week.

Mayor Don Iveson said he’d like to see this “missing middle,” or medium density, clustered around employment centres, new consolidated schools, LRT stations and high-frequency bus routes.

“The demand is pent up,” Iveson said, after bemoaning how long it takes to get these developments through the permitting process now. It seems like Edmonton’s council is dealing with five-plex projects the same way Calgary’s council takes a one-by-one approach to secondary suites.

If Edmonton wants to compete globally for talent, it needs affordable living in walkable neighbourhoods close to the core, he said. “Cities that have this housing form are very, very successful.”

Councillors also voted to build data-based profiles of each neighbourhood to help residents identify good locations for this middle density, and see how it might benefit existing schools and businesses. City officials will be bringing an initial action plan on middle density to the public in early 2018.

Several residents also spoke at committee. Irene Blain of West Jasper Place suggested a new approach called “form-based” zoning could help, and many residents would be more accepting of change if the city’s crackdown on poor building practices was successful.

Developers often advocate for form-based zoning as a way to focus on how the outside of a building fits the context, rather than regulating how many people and uses can be inside.

That could mean if two similar houses sit side by side, one could be a single-family home while the other might have three suites and a café.

The Ward 1 councillor built one for family and one to sell in Jasper Park. But now he and the rest of council have run into a major problem with the city’s infill strategy: it’s just too expensive.

New city research released Thursday concludes two-thirds of residents can’t afford a $360,000 average-priced home in Edmonton, and most infill homes are listed for well above average.

Knack said the skinny home he tried to sell cost him at least $515,000 to build, plus property tax, legal and real estate fees. There was no market to sell that in Jasper Park. So after listing it all summer, he rented it instead.

City research suggests skinny homes are becoming popular in a few neighbourhoods, but they’re not the answer to ensuring homes are affordable on a regular salary. If council wants to see more options, it needs to look at row houses, and courtyard and walk-up apartments.

It also needs to review the rules, officials say. Last year, 88 per cent of developers trying to build these middle-density homes had to go through the time-consuming process of getting a variance.

Two blocks from Knack’s skinny homes, developer Baidar Rana with Parklane Developments is building 10 units of row housing on what was two 50-foot lots across from Jasper Place Library.

Developer Baidar Rana is building 10 units of row homes on what was previously two 50-foot lots across from the Jasper Place Library. This view is looking between the rows, where residents would drive down into their garages. A neighbour’s house is seen in the distance.

This summer, he listed the first ones for $350,000. That’s for a small two- or three-bedroom, street-level unit with no or minimal yard. It has air conditioning, hardwood floors, stainless steel appliances and a finished garage.

Getting permits “was a nightmare, to be honest. Coun. Knack helped a lot,” said Rana. The site will be close to LRT. It will definitely change what neighbours see, but also give eight more families a chance to live centrally at street level.

City officials say middle density homes are key to affordability.

The city research is heading to council’s urban planning committee Wednesday. It’s an interim update with officials aiming to release an action plan in early 2018.

Knack’s decision to build skinny homes was idealistic and experimental. “This was meant to add value to the community, bring more people in,” he said.

He tore down a dilapidated home, subdivided and built new partly just to live the developer experience, sharing financial data with the community league.

It’s convinced him higher density is needed. The city needs to rezone swaths of land along transit corridors to remove barriers to development, he said. It also needs to let people build garage and secondary suites more easily, including on smaller lots.

City officials offer 37 solutions from other cities used to encourage redevelopment, including new kinds of zoning codes that ignore how many units are in a building as long as it’s a certain size.

They’re looking at tax code changes that charge based on the lot size more than the building on it.

Case in point. City identifying too many constraints for this proposal on very large RF1 corner lot, proximity to major corridor & transit pic.twitter.com/P2GBPKTjGb

Louis Pereira, a residential infill designer, said developers simply can’t build many five-unit or even three-unit projects they propose. The city says it wants them, then turns it down because it’s beside an existing single-family home.

Rezoning entire blocks in redevelopment areas would let everyone know what to expect, he said: “It will always seem incompatible until you start seeing more.”

Picking those locations will be key.

“We took a broad brush with lot subdivision. In this case, we’re going to have to look more closely,” said Mayor Don Iveson, suggesting it should be clustered around employment nodes like downtown and the universities, along high-frequency transit routes and new LRT stations.

“The price of housing has really doubled in the last 15 years. … For lots of families, parents have to co-sign for their kids now,” he said, arguing for density and shared walls to bring the price down. “There’s still a big gap around affordability.”

]]>http://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/councillor-who-built-skinny-homes-finds-infill-too-expensive-to-sell-in-edmonton/feed0Andrew KnackejstolteArchitect says long-delayed Camsell Hospital condos to open in 2018http://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/architect-says-long-delayed-camsell-hospital-condos-to-open-in-2018
http://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/architect-says-long-delayed-camsell-hospital-condos-to-open-in-2018#respondMon, 28 Aug 2017 22:15:29 +0000http://edmontonjournal.com/?p=722908]]>Construction on Edmonton’s long-shuttered Camsell Hospital is finally going full steam, with the first new condo units ready for residents at the end of 2018, says the developer’s architect.

Crews still need to redo the roof and finish the interior in the new residential condo units, but the asbestos is out and Gene Dub said Monday 90 per cent of the new windows are in place. His team will also start digging for the underground parkade this spring.

Dub designed, owns and is managing the conversion of the old hospital into residential condos.

He said the positive side of the delay is that they’re now added an Indigenous garden into the plan to honour the Métis, First Nations and Inuit communities who have a long history at the former hospital and the previous hospital on the site.

It was one of Canada’s largest Indian hospitals, part of a segregated health-care system where many First Nations people were sent during decades of tuberculosis outbreaks.

The Charles Camsell site has been a neighbourhood eyesore since it was closed 21 years ago. Dub has owned it since 2004, and Inglewood neighbours have often expressed frustration over the slow pace of reconstruction.

Dub said “the delay now is pretty much under control. There’s still some financing that’s required, but there’s enough financing to continue until such time as the new financing arrives.” He spoke after the 25th anniversary celebration for City Hall, a building he designed but did not do the project management for.

Coun. Ben Henderson (from left), architect Gene Dub and former project manager Bob Walker after the 25th anniversary of the opening of City Hall.

Dub said his team will be designing the new Indigenous garden over the winter and plans to have Indigenous members of the community involved.

When asked if this garden will help ease the heartache associated with this site, Dub said he wants people to know this building was not the one used during the major tuberculosis outbreaks, when so many First Nations people were separated from their homes and families.

“The heartache was not in this building. The heartache was in the building before,” he said, calling that a key point. “Everyone thinks this building has ghosts and all kinds of things that are negative. But it’s not this building. It’s the previous building that was torn down.”

The first phase of construction will have 200 units at the main site and 89 units on the south property south of 114 Avenue. Dub said he hopes those will open by the end of 2018. Another 300 units would be built after that.

“We plan to build it whether there’s market demand or not,” he said, saying he’s targeting the mid-range of the market and hopes the exposed original concrete and steel will appeal to a younger demographic.

Related

]]>http://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/architect-says-long-delayed-camsell-hospital-condos-to-open-in-2018/feed0082817-no_object-Camsell_hospital-W.jpgejstolteRespondent pool for Edmonton's online survey program doesn't reflect city's demographicshttp://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/respondent-pool-for-edmontons-online-survey-program-doesnt-reflect-citys-demographics
http://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/respondent-pool-for-edmontons-online-survey-program-doesnt-reflect-citys-demographics#respondSat, 10 Jun 2017 03:37:24 +0000http://edmontonjournal.com/?p=685938]]>Three years after its introduction and having recently reaching the milestone of 7,000 members, the city’s online survey program is still dealing with a response base that doesn’t accurately reflect the city’s demographics.

Edmonton Insight Community, introduced in 2014, has quickly grown into a valuable resource for gauging public opinion, but relative to the city’s municipal census, skew towards higher incomes and homeowners.

Cory Segin, the city’s director of public engagement, said his office recognizes the issue and takes measures to counteract it. They’re able to weight responses against the true demographics of the city and most online surveys are done in tandem with targeted telephone surveys.

Since January, 48 per cent of responses to mixed-topic surveys which have incomes reported came from individuals with household incomes above $100,000. The municipal census had only 34 per cent of Edmontonians report a household income over $100,000. Responses also skew in favour of those who own their home. Eighty-one per cent of responses came from homeowners, 18 points higher than the rate from the municipal census.

The municipal census does have flaws. It is voluntary and one-quarter of those who filled it out did not answer the household income question.

“It allows us to ask citizens questions that have gone unasked in the past,” Segin said of the survey program, noting it is a cost-effective way to engage citizens because there is no need to hire third-party researchers.

The Edmonton Insights surveys are just one way the Public Engagement Office measures opinions on issues. Segin said that survey responses not reflecting city demographics is a point of discussion in his office and it’s working to reach under-represented communities.

Segin said the topics with the highest response rates are the same ones that garner lots of debate around the city, such as bicycle infrastructure and infill initiatives.

]]>http://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/respondent-pool-for-edmontons-online-survey-program-doesnt-reflect-citys-demographics/feed0060316-TEC-Digital_Life-Cyber_Spring_Cleaning-Tips-0606_computers-W.jpgscottdleitchEdmonton's garage suites remain the realm of the privilegedhttp://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/edmontons-garage-suites-remain-the-realm-of-the-privileged
http://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/edmontons-garage-suites-remain-the-realm-of-the-privileged#respondThu, 04 May 2017 02:40:48 +0000http://edmontonjournal.com/?p=672510]]>Garage suites in Edmonton still mostly belong to the rich.

They’re middle- to high-income residents, mostly living in mature areas, who are paying an average of $145,000 to build suites for aging parents or because they believe in urban density, said Ashley Salvador, a researcher who surveyed 64 per cent of local owners.

“They’re making values-based decisions to build a garage or garden suite,” added Travis Fong, who helped Salvador launch a new advocacy group, YEGarage Suites, to make it easier for people to get involved. He believes construction will be easier for anyone once Edmonton simplifies the process and removes more zoning barriers.

“These are early adopters who are willing to jump through a lot of … rigorous hoops,” Fong said. “They do believe in density and in having a more sustainable, dense, active city.”

The couple spoke Wednesday after council’s urban planning committee pushed city officials to create pilot projects, upgrade back alleys and provide other incentives to encourage rows of laneway homes near LRT stations and other walkable areas. Planners promised to look for groups of residents wanting to get involved and start a pilot as early as this summer.

Garage suites have been pitched as one way to create more affordable housing in mature areas. Homeowners add a rental suite to help pay a mortgage, while renters get more options in quiet neighbourhoods.

Salvador, a recent graduate from Dalhousie University’s College of Sustainability, got involved because of the social benefit. Half of the suites are rented to friends or family, often with backyard space shared and a well-worn path between the suite and the main house. The suites promote multi-generational living, said Salvador. “I love that aspect of it.”

Salvador knocked on 122 doors for her research and 72 owners agreed to fill out her survey. Of those, 72 per cent had a household income higher than $100,000 and 45 per cent of households earned more than $150,000.

Nearly half of the owners designed the suite themselves, 42 per cent did some or all of the construction and 18 per cent built it just for extra work or storage space.

Forty-five per cent paid for the unit out of savings, while 36 per cent used a home equity line of credit.

Garage suites are fairly new in Edmonton. They’ve only been allowed on any regular-sized mature neighbourhood lot since 2015 but, until Salvador’s research, little data existed about the people who built and occupied them.

Fong and Salvador have been running garage suite workshops, connecting interested residents with experts in finance, zoning and green building techniques. They have a sold-out garage suite tour this weekend and a meet-the-builder event May 13. But it’s a temporary campaign. Both are heading to the University of Waterloo this fall to study for for masters degrees in economics and planning respectively.

City officials say 120 garage or garden suites have been built in Edmonton in the last five years.

Council members pushed for the pilot project Wednesday, saying they’ve so far heard less resistance to this form of density.

It can be a way to preserve heritage homes, while giving owners a new source of income to finance renovations, said Mayor Don Iveson.

“I just want to make sure it happens,” said Coun. Ben Henderson as officials debated whether to hold a separate public consultation on promoting and regulating garage suites or leave it as part of the next round of infill debates.

But Coun. Bryan Anderson urged his colleagues to be careful what impact these larger back garages have on neighbours. “(Infill) can’t be at all costs.”

Pilot projects

Officials are planning a suite of zoning changes this summer to reduce parking requirements, improve design and reduce the size of the second storey.

A pilot project would likely involve a small area where garage suites are already popular, and would only go forward with residents support, said planner Kalen Anderson. “We would need to find willing partners,” she said. It could include pavement and lighting upgrades or altered zoning requirements. But those details have not been determined.

The city is also developing a pilot project with so-called pork chop lots – two or three sites where a lot has been split back to front with the back portion sold for a separately owned house.

]]>http://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/edmontons-garage-suites-remain-the-realm-of-the-privileged/feed0050317-suite2.jpg-laneway-W.jpgejstolteLargest, most restrictive covenant yet on the table in Greater Hardistyhttp://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/largest-most-restrictive-covenant-yet-on-the-table-in-greater-hardisty
http://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/largest-most-restrictive-covenant-yet-on-the-table-in-greater-hardisty#respondSat, 08 Apr 2017 12:00:03 +0000http://edmontonjournal.com/?p=660326]]>Edmonton could see its largest, most prescriptive legal covenant signed yet this Sunday and some people are warning residents to be careful.

The legal agreement – a caveat to be voluntarily placed on homeowners’ properties – would prevent lot splitting and skinny houses on participating lots in the Greater Hardisty area.

But it also prevents duplexes, row houses, large daycares, home-based businesses with more than one employee and any relaxation on a two-stall per house parking requirement.

“Many of the neighbours around where I am have the same perspective, it’s just a matter of preserving the community,” said John Smith, a resident on 108 Avenue who plans to sign the legal covenant Sunday. He lives in an area with large front yards and single-storey homes.

“We want a lot to be a lot. It’s a home,” he said. “In my area, there’s half a dozen of us in a row that are going to sign.”

The movement toward restrictive covenants grew out of frustration with new infill opportunities allowed by City Hall. First residents in neighbourhoods such as Rio Terrace, Lansdowne and Valleyview put up anti-subdivision signs in 2015. Then they started to ban it.

Westbrook Estates was the first to sign its covenant last fall, getting roughly 65 per cent of residents committed, said Darren Jacknisky, one of the organizers. They’re now going back to approach residents who recently bought properties not yet included, and they’ve heard anecdotally some people are buying in Westbrook because the covenant lets them know what to expect. There are 290 single-family homes in the neighbourhood, which surrounds the Derrick Golf and Winter Club.

‘Eyes wide open’

Ward 8 Coun. Ben Henderson said he worries people signing this might not understand the full consequences.

“People need to be doing it with their eyes wide open,” he said, urging residents in Greater Hardisty to seek legal counsel first. “I just worry it’s not in their best interest. If you sign it and your neighbour doesn’t, all you’ve done is bring down the value of your property. You’re restricting what your property can be used for.”

Greater Hardisty includes the neighbourhoods of Capilano, Fulton Place and Gold Bar – more than 2,700 properties with single-family homes where owners would be eligible to sign.

Lots of interest

The community drew up the agreement together, with various residents lobbying for clauses that were important to them, said Smith.

“I know there is a lot of interest. We’ll have to see if they actually come out and sign,” said Smith.

Once signed, the covenant or caveat is registered with the Alberta Land Titles Office. It stays with the land, no matter who owns it.

The Greater Hardisty covenant includes a note that it can be reopened and amended every 10 years, but only if 75 per cent of the people currently owning the land in the covenant agree.

Taking neighbours to court

“They’ve essentially written their own zoning,” said Kalen Anderson, a director in Edmonton’s planning department.

The city doesn’t take a position on whether residents should do this or not, but it will not enforce the agreement. Residents have to take their neighbours to court if they feel someone is out of line, she said. That’s what happens in Glenora, where half the neighbourhood has a covenant from 1911.

A map of the 1911 Carruthers Caveat in Glenora.

“We have community members who are suing each other. I wouldn’t characterize this as a positive development,” Anderson said.

Restrictive covenants were common in the early 1900s, before cities wrote zoning regulations. But they “reflect the thinking of a moment in time,” said Anderson, pointing to one rule in the Glenora-area caveat that requires homeowners to spend at least $3,000 to build their home.

“One hundred years from now, what if 75 per cent (of Greater Hardisty caveat holders) never got it together in all these decade check-ins and we were stuck with caveats that insisted on parking stalls and we’re not even using cars?” she said.

“That’s why the zoning bylaw, it’s a living thing and it constantly adapts,” she said. “What do you do with your property if you’ve locked into one way of thinking … but the rest of the world is moving in a different direction? We’re just on the cusp of looking forward to what will happen next with (artificial intelligence) or automated vehicles.”

]]>http://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/largest-most-restrictive-covenant-yet-on-the-table-in-greater-hardisty/feed0040717-0408_news_covenant52073.jpg-covenant-W.jpgejstolteEdmonton's new infill squad gives 114 tickets to neighbourhood homebuildershttp://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/edmontons-new-infill-squad-gives-114-tickets-to-neighbourhood-homebuilders
http://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/edmontons-new-infill-squad-gives-114-tickets-to-neighbourhood-homebuilders#respondThu, 30 Mar 2017 23:00:41 +0000http://edmontonjournal.com/?p=656891]]>Edmonton’s new infill police made surprise visits on 416 residential building sites in their first year of operations and community leagues say it’s starting to make a difference.

“The general impression is things have improved,” said Bev Zubot, planning analyst for the Edmonton Federation of Community Leagues.

More boulevard tree trunks are being protected, and more builders are getting permits before crossing the boulevard and driving over the tree roots, she said. “There was no enforcement of that before, zero.”

The compliance team released its first update Thursday, one year after council sought to crack down on fly-by-night operators. It goes to council’s urban planning committee for public presentation and debate Wednesday.

The team found 815 infractions, gave 493 verbal warnings, 205 written notices, 114 tickets and three stop work orders. The city expects some of those to be fought in court.

Issues on the ground

According to the city report, about 40 per cent of the tickets were for blocking or occupying the road or sidewalk illegally, and 18 per cent were for driving a vehicle across the sidewalk or boulevard without a permit.

More than half of the written warnings were for tracking mud and other debris onto the roads. Thirty warnings were given for noise outside of the allowable hours.

The two-member teams made visits three days a week and inspected 40 per cent of all building sites last year, some because of complaints and others on a proactive basis. The rest of the time was spent on follow-up visits and office work. The city added one more peace officer to the team in January, but only expects to get to 10 per cent more sites.

More staff needed

Zubot said the federation’s building committee would like the team to be large enough so it can visit every site. They also want a visit during excavation, which is when damage to neighbouring properties can occur.

In 2008, Edmonton set a 10-year goal of having one quarter of all new homes to be built each year located within existing areas. On Tuesday, city officials released last year’s total: 24 per cent.

“We’re feeling pretty good about some of the efforts we’ve made to attract investment back to the inner city and mature neighbourhoods,” said Peter Ohm, head of city planning.

“It’s a combination of all the work we’ve done,” said Ohm, pointing to the increased zoning opportunities to create secondary suites, split lots and build duplexes, plus towers in the downtown core.

The city was at 13 per cent in 2015, down from a high of 19 per cent in 2011. The total number of new units has crept steadily up.

According to the Mature Neighbourhood Reinvestment Report, of the 2,022 units approved in mature and core neighbourhoods last year, half were in the downtown core and most of those were in just two towers. Queen Mary Park, Griesbach and Strathcona saw the next largest increases, with 180 units, 149 units and 87 units, respectively.

City-wide, residential construction saw a 23.2 per cent decrease when measured by the value of the permits pulled.

Total number of new units built in mature and core neighbourhoods in Edmonton by year. New figures were released in a report Tuesday, Feb. 21, 2017.

Mayor Don Iveson said the numbers represent a narrow moment in time, but are still encouraging.

“We need to see over several years how it shapes up,” he said, adding that he’d also like to start tracking affordability.

]]>http://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/2016-infill-numbers-nearly-reach-city-halls-10-year-target/feed0051816-fill.jpg-0519_news_housing-W.jpgejstolteTotal number of new units built in mature and core neighbourhoods in Edmonton by year. New figures were released in a report Tuesday Feb. 21.Why do developers concentrate infill homes in Westmount and Glenora, councillor askshttp://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/why-do-developers-concentrate-infill-homes-in-westmount-and-glenora-councillor-asks
http://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/why-do-developers-concentrate-infill-homes-in-westmount-and-glenora-councillor-asks#respondTue, 07 Feb 2017 16:28:16 +0000http://edmontonjournal.com/?p=632318]]>Achieving higher density through infill is the best way to give millennials a chance to buy a home near the core, ensure Edmonton’s financial stability and save farmland from sprawl, says Coun. Scott McKeen.

So why are developers focused on Westmount and Glenora — neighbourhoods where it’s simply impossible to build and sell a new home at entry-level prices?

That breeds cynicism, said McKeen: “People in Glenora and Westmount have come back to me and said: ‘This is ridiculous. A $900,000 skinny (home), who is that affordable for?'”

Last week, Mayor Don Iveson moved to study a new approach to infill, looking to allow further increased densities and height, but just in select pre-war neighbourhoods where it makes sense. The neighbourhoods have not yet been chosen. McKeen intends to follow that at Tuesday’s council meeting with a request to start with the basic economics.

He received development permit data from 2013 to 2016 for all lot subdivisions and skinny homes in mature neighbourhoods, where skinnies are now the most popular form of infill. They show 34 per cent were concentrated in just five neighbourhoods: Westmount, Glenora, Inglewood, Bonnie Doon and Belgravia.

Westmount had the highest, with 64 narrow lots created between 2013 and 2016 (that means 32 lots split into two). Fifteen other neighbourhoods saw 10 to 25 lots created. Most neighbourhoods saw only one or two.

Neighbourhoods such as McCauley and Parkdale, central neighbourhoods that have been asking for increased market-rate investment, didn’t have any.

McKeen wants city officials to first study the reasons why infill is so concentrated now, then clearly explain the market and economics to residents. With that information, communities can figure out together what incentives could bring the type of infill that would make their communities stronger.

“We’ve talked about built form (the height, set backs and placement of windows) at the expense of everything else, at the expense of the realities today for younger families,” said McKeen.

“The public will understand if they’re given good information… The first thing we have to do is explain why it’s not going into those neighbourhoods and it’s land economics.”

Mick Graham of Singletree Builders said the answer to why skinny homes cost as much as they do is easy. He paid $400,000 for a lot with a teardown house in Westmount. Building each house costs roughly $420,000. That’s already $620,000 a house.

The city charges $21,000 for water and sewer service connections, 10 times the cost of a service connection in the suburbs, Graham said. Then he likes to budget a 20 per cent margin, to pay himself, for contingencies and to cover the cost of paying for the land up front.

In new suburbs, builders place a downpayment, with the rest paid when the house is complete, he said. In infill, they buy the house upfront, carrying the bank loan as they wait for city permits — an average of 100 days per infill lot last year.

It’s harder to sell a house that expensive in neighbourhoods that aren’t as hot on the real estate market. That’s why Graham argued at council that increased density is the only way to get affordability.

He figures he could put a fourplex — two townhouses facing forward and two back — on one 50-foot (15-metre) lot and get the price down to about $400,000 each. That would give a household three bedrooms, a ground-level entrance and a small yard within walking distance from transit or downtown.

Editor’s note: This story has been corrected to reflect Mick Graham’s calculations estimating the cost of a skinny home.]]>http://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/why-do-developers-concentrate-infill-homes-in-westmount-and-glenora-councillor-asks/feed0Mick GrahamejstolteTable of top neighbourhoods